Apologies to Europe!

Ironically, when British Cinema has had arguably its best year as a cultural producer for a long time, we are saddled with a Con-Dem government that makes me ashamed to whisper my national identity. The Europhobic zombies who sit on the Tory backbenches look as if they have managed to damage everything this last weekend by putting pressure on a cowardly Prime Minister who has used his veto to take the UK into exile while the rest of the EU tries to work co-operatively.

But we shouldn’t be surprised. The British film industry has often been slow to take advantage of European audio-visual support programmes, preferring to spend time worrying about Hollywood rather than looking towards our European partners. There are plenty of exceptions of course and this year we have celebrated the success of the new StudioCanal operation and the UK/French/Swedish co-operation on Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy.

Most independent film producers in Europe look for support from Eurimages – the fund set up by the Council of Europe and its 36 member states. Today it was announced in a Screendaily report that Eurimages, “the Strasbourg-based fund” had “an interest in working relationships with third countries who are close to Europe and have a European tradition such as Israel, Argentina, Canada and South Africa where you have a certain common understanding about film.”

This seems like a good idea. It’s interesting to note that only one European state is not a member of Eurimages. Which country could that be I wonder? See if you can find the UK amongst the 36. No? Well that will be because the UK is a ‘special case’. It’s pathetic really.

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2 thoughts on “Apologies to Europe!”

Hi Roy. Well said. I don’t understand why we left Eurimages in 1996, especially when we were getting more money out than we put in. What was disheartening was that “new Labour” didn’t rectify this in 13 years. Not wishing to let the current shower off the hook. It would seem there is something rotten at the heart of British government with regard to Europe and not just the “europhobic zombies” – surely a great Eurimages production in there somewhere. Bill

Yes, it’s a shame that Labour didn’t press to re-enter the scheme. I did find an Early Day Motion to do just that last month put down by the Tory ‘wet’ Peter Bottomley and supported by 1 Lib Dem and 13 Labour members. So some MPs can be persuaded.